Kontinentalverschiebungen und Polverschiebungen — Ursachen und Probleme

Abstract

Zusammenfassung AbstractThe crust of the earth is traversed by a lattice of tectonic lineaments which, since the Precambrian Era, were always and again acting as wren& faults. These shearing movements, independent of the specific crustal structure, are thought to he caused by the wandering of the poles. For the directions and movements of the lineaments correspond to the stress field that was induced by the readjustment of the geoid. The bursting lineaments caused a splitting of the continental masses. The great original continents of the Paleozoie Era disturbed the *) Anschrift des Verfassers: Prof. Dr. H. ILLIES, Karlsruhe, Kaiserstr. 12. 549Aufs~itze balance of revolution. There was a trend to separate the disturbing masses and to furnish the surface of the earth as proportionally as possible with continents. Thus, divergent forces started to work on the lineaments. The lineaments were stretched and became rift valleys. When the forces of the eontinentaI drift became overwhelming, the rift valleys burst along their median line. A new continent split off. The wandering continents endeavoured and are still endeavouring to reach, in the first place, the Pacific Ocean trying to confine it peripherieally. From this trend comes tile conformable architecture of the eireumpacific tectonics. The drifting masses effeeted secondary distm'banees of the balance of the rotating gyroscope. The poles tried to escape the wandering masses. Once more, lineaments became active, and the process of splitting continued. Consequently, the wandering of the poles and the continental drift are thought to be mutually initiating and controlling processes. The orogenic phases of the folding and the taphrogenic phases of the rift valley forming are in their global coincidence the display of this very process that concerns the entire crust of the earth. R6sum6

Mega-Undations: A New Model for the Earth's Evolution

“…The second solution is preferred in this paper. Illies (1965a) also reaches the conclusion that the rifting of the Paleozoic continents followed preferentially old lineaments that had previously acted as wrench faults.…”

“…Then deep trenches were formed in the mobile belts of the Alpine system, where basic to ultra-basic magmas reached the sea-floor, forming pillow lavas and other outflows without pores (because of the high pressure of the overlying water columns). Finally parts of the continental crust are progressively transformed into areas with crusts of the oceanic type (Illies, 1965a). Such 'bceanizations" have been described by the author from the Caribbean Sea (Van Bemmelen, 1958) and by Beloussov and Ruditch (1961) from the Japan Sea.…”